Stephen Kriss, skriss@mosaicmennonites.org
The newly configured Franconia Conference Review Steering Committee met for the first time on April 21, 2010, at the Mennonite Conference Center in Harleysville, Pa., to continue to set a course for the review scheduled for release in mid-May 2010. The review, performed by LaVern Yutzy, consulting associate with Mennonite Health Services Alliance, is intended to offer recommendations and set a direction for the Conference toward a hopeful future. The committee’s next meeting is April 28, 2010, with additional meetings scheduled over the following months to guide processes on decision-making and communication.
In this week’s meeting, the committee named Mike Derstine, pastor of Plains Mennonite Church, Hatfield, Pa., and Joy Sutter, Executive Director, Bux-Mont Oncology Hematology Medical Associates and member of Salford Mennonite Church, as co-chairpersons. The committee reported a positive response to opportunities to provide information by email, postcard and through personal contact with LaVern Yutzy and recommended an extension of consulting hours to fully process and consider the volume of responses. Along with Sutter and Derstine, team members include Donella Clemens (Perkasie congregation), Randy Heacock (Doylestown congregation), Beny Krisbianto (Nations Worship Center, Philadelphia), Jim Laverty (Souderton congregation) and Karen Moyer (Rocky Ridge congregation at Quakertown, Pa.).
With the deadline for responses set for April 24, 2010, the committee and Franconia Conference Board of Directors will meet together on May 4, 2010, to consider the review and the situation going forward. The review is not intended to answer all questions about the recent events regarding staffing decisions, but is focused on finding a path forward together. The report will be crafted by Yutzy upon completion of all interviews and consideration of comments submitted by email and postcard. The committee’s intent is to provide guidance for establishing patterns of communication, discernment and decision-making for the upcoming report and recommendations that will be posted at www.mosaicmennonites.org in mid-May 2010.
The committee continues to call the conference to prayer—communally in the worship life of congregations as well as individually that together we might continue to proclaim and incarnate Christ’s way of peace, healing and hope.
The opinions expressed in articles posted on Mosaic’s website are those of the author and may not reflect the official policy of Mosaic Conference. Mosaic is a large conference, crossing ethnicities, geographies, generations, theologies, and politics. Each person can only speak for themselves; no one can represent “the conference.” May God give us the grace to hear what the Spirit is speaking to us through people with whom we disagree and the humility and courage to love one another even when those disagreements can’t be bridged.